More on Deadlines

I have given this topic a lot of though over the last few days. A few
years ago I had taught in an alternative middle school for high at-risk
students. Basically these students had eliminated all chances to remain
in their regular school....most had bigger problems and had parole
officers. The philosophy of the school as procedure required teachers
to fill in daily point sheets for the students, which began a way for me
to re-assess my own way of assessing student work. Instead of giving
lesson or project grades, I began to give daily grades. Absenteeism was
high....my policy was you finish what you start. Having a positive
attitude was part of the curriculum, so ditching a project before
completed was considered unacceptable.
Daily graded enabled me to grade them by their daily effort with the
lesson at hand, and eliminated waste of art supplies. When projects
were completed I gave a final grade for the project, and highlighted it
as such so that it would be weighted more heavily than the daily grades.
I believe in maintaining high standards for students to complete work,
bu somtimes our imposed deadlines injure the successes and peserverance
students may obtain by working through an art project thoroughly to
'its' completion. My whole way of thinking and evaluating student work
changed and it worked for the students. It may seem like a lot of work
to give out daily grades for students, but it was just done while they
were in class as a part of my class procedure, towards the conclusion of
class. It also reinforced process over product because there might be
many, many good days for students and then one bad day which destroyed
what they had accomplished. Sometimes the daily grades became a diary
for them that they were able to succeed and gave them initiative to
regain the energy to continue or restart again.